William Henry Giles Kingston

“ As the warmth of the sun increased, the trees began to drip, and the lovely spectacle vanished by noon.
“We need not regret it, for beautiful as it was, I believe that we may see many more to surpass it before the return of spring,” said Mr Ashton. “Ah! little do our pitying friends at home guess the ample amends which nature makes to us for what we have lost. I prize the blessings we enjoyed in England; but, after all, we have only exchanged them for others which our beneficent Maker has bestowed on us of equal value.” ”

“ The breeze freshened; a black cloud came up along the course of the river from Lake Huron; it rushed across the sky, followed by others, casting a shadow over the lake. A shriek from Sophy made Philip rush out from his workshop, saw in hand, followed by Harry. The white sail of D’Arcy’s boat had disappeared, and a dark mass was alone visible on the spot where she had been.
“He is a good swimmer, and will have got upon the bottom,” cried Philip; but his heart misgave him, for the cold wind had made D’Arcy put on his thick coat and heavy boots; Harry ran towards their large boat. ”

“ Life had many charms in spite of the one disappointment, which had, rather given a gravity to his manner than in any way embittered his existence. He had hoped to do something in the world—his duty, at all events. He had many too depending on him. How would they bear his loss? He looked upward. A thick veil hung over his head. Below was the dark water—on every side the wide expanse of treacherous ice and snow. ”

“ Harry and Charley now and then sighed for the woods and their lake, but as they took long walks every day, their health in no way suffered by the change;—indeed, they could not help confessing, that however pleasant it might be to carpenter, and dig, and look after their horses and cows, and to sail and row on the lake, they had brains which might be employed to some better purpose, if those brains were properly cultivated; so they stuck manfully to their studies and made a progress which surprised even themselves. ”

“ It is a calumny on the feathered tribes of Canada to assert that they have no song; the blackbird can sing when he is inclined, as sweetly as his brother in England, and the Canadian robin’s notes are as full of glee as those of his smaller namesake in the old country.
“By turning our eyes from the bare maples, beeches, and oaks, towards the pine trees, we might fancy that summer had come back again,” said Philip; “the Indian summer at all events. Should to-morrow be like this, I propose knocking up D’Arcy. ”

“ We should hear nothing of sick headaches in Canada, if all the young ladies would put their pretty little feet on to snow-shoes, and step over the country as you are doing, or rather will be doing before long, for you are on the ice just now,” cried Mr Norman from a handsome sleigh which drove up to them. The horses’ harness, surmounted by a belfry, as Harry called the frame to which the bells were suspended, was covered with bright-coloured braiding, and rich skins filled the sleigh itself and hung over the back. From among them a lady’s head was seen. ”

“ Still, I fancy that people can make fortunes in Australia much faster than one can here.”
“May be so; but fortune is not the only thing desirable,” said Philip. “All settlers do not make fortunes in Australia,—we hear only of the successful ones; and then I cannot help thinking, that our Canadian climate, with its wonderful changes, our varied scenery, our institutions, and our society,—I don’t mean in such an out-of-the-way place as this, but such as are found at Toronto and elsewhere,—are items which may be placed to the credit of this Province, and give it a superiority over every other. ”

“ Now poor Jack Mason will go back to England, his friends helping him, and abuse Canada, and say that it is a country totally unfit for a gentleman to live in—that hardy, rough fellows may subsist, but that no one can do more—no one can make a fortune.”
“A man must have energy, talent, and perseverance to succeed here, as well as at home,” said Philip. “The difference is, that in England, possessing them, he may not succeed; here, possessing them, he must succeed. To commence the life of a backwoodsman, he must have health and strength, with the other qualifications you have mentioned. ”

“ I have never met a happier family than yours appears to be. What did you mean by saying that?”
“Well, I do not think that we are ruined really, sir,” said Charley, artlessly; “still, my papa had many thousand pounds a-year till lately, and we lived in a large house in London, and had another in the country, and Philip was at Oxford and Harry at Eton, and I was going there; and now we are to live in a log-hut in the back woods in Canada, and that makes us all so jolly, because it will be such capital fun. ”

“ There is one especially, who, probably, begins the day after breakfast by smoking a pipe or two, then takes axe or spade in hand, and coming in to an early dinner feels his solitude, and that he must have a talk with somebody. Instead of continuing his work, he mounts his cob, after taking a glass or two of rum or whiskey grog—the more out of spirits he feels the stiffer it is—and rides off to knock up some neighbour, perhaps his equal, or perhaps utterly unfit to be his companion, as far as social intercourse is concerned. On the way he looks in at the store-house ”

“ Two of Mary’s brothers found their way almost in rags to Ashton, having in vain endeavoured to find employment in England. They expressed themselves ready to work, and Harry and Charley afforded them some practical lessons, which enabled them to begin with advantage. At first they complained that their limbs ached terribly; but in a short time they had to confess that food honestly gained by hard labour, was far pleasanter than the bread of idleness. They persevered, and in the course of a few years were able to purchase land for themselves. ”

“ Away went Philip down to the boat, whence his father with the rest had been bringing up her lading. Who could have recognised in the energetic, high-spirited backwoodsman Philip had become, the refined and somewhat sedate and stiff young student of a year ago. By-the-bye, the kitchen of which he spoke was a lean-to of birch-bark, under which a camp stove had been placed; near it was a shed prepared for the reception of the stores, among which Peter proposed to take up his abode. Philip’s plan of fitting up the cottage was much admired. ”

“ It was wonderful with what equanimity Mr D’Arcy consented to remain the guest of the Ashtons. He was not idle, for he read while the ladies worked, taught Charley to net, and took Philip’s place as his schoolmaster in the evening, and imparted a large stock of backwoodsman’s lore to all the family. Philip and Harry had, directly they returned after rescuing him, set off in their big boat, and arrived at his clearing in time to prevent poor Terry from going out of his mind, which he was nearly doing at seeing his master’s boat drift by, and believing he was lost. ”

“ Come, Phil; come, Harry, come; we shall have him, sure enough, for he does not seem inclined to move. I suspect the tap you gave him, Phil, with your axe, hurt him more than we fancied.”
The latter remarks were uttered as the three brothers, with their spears ready for action, hurried towards the spot Charley had indicated. There, indeed, was a brown heap, from out of which a set of sharp teeth and a pair of twinkling eyes appeared. “There, what do you think of that?” asked Charley. The bear lay in a sort of root-formed cavern, under the bank. ”

“ Mr Ashton took it in good part. “Thank you, my friend, we have come along very well,” he answered. “Can you tell me, Have my son and his servant been here lately?”
“Your two young men were up here not ten minutes ago. They’ve gone back to the boat, I guess. They’re no great hands at liquoring. If you shout they’ll hear you.”
“Philip a-hoy!” shouted Harry and Charley, their shrill voices sounding clearly through the dark pine forest which shut in the settlement on either side, and sweeping over the calm waters of the lake. ”

“ Why they made all this wealth, they created all these advantages, by their labour, their intelligence, and perseverance. They are theirs—to enjoy—to benefit by. It is said in England, ‘We do not find rich Canadians come back and settle at home, as so many Australians do.’ Granted; Canada, I say, is essentially the country to reside in. People who have made fortunes here do not go away, for the best of reasons; because here they have all the requirements of civilisation, all the advantages which the Australians go to England to obtain. ”

“ It snowed still, but not the dry, hard snow of the previous evening, and Philip felt more than ever anxious on account of the warmth of the weather. Before the sun could have quite risen, rain came, mixed with the snow, and gradually there was more rain and less snow, till the rain came down so fast that they were glad to get into their hut for shelter. They well knew that nothing so rapidly causes ice to become rotten as does rain. They might be prisoners, therefore, till it had sufficiently melted to allow of a boat being pushed through it. “But it cannot be rotten yet,” said Harry. ”

“ I commenced the world without a sixpence, and have worked my way up to wealth and independence by the proper use of my hands and head. A settler, to rise, must have both. We welcome hands in the province. The possessor of a head benefits himself chiefly—not that we could get on without heads either.”
As they drove up to the door, D’Arcy was the first person to meet them. Philip’s heart sunk within him in spite of what Mr Norman had been saying. ”

“ No life can more conduce to virtue and a healthful state of body and mind than that which the industrious settler in the country leads out here. He has hard work and rough living, may be; but what is that, whether he be gentle or simple, compared to what he would have had to endure, had he without fortune remained idle at home? That is the question all settlers must ask themselves over and over again, whenever they get out of sorts with the Province. ”

“ Once having got a footing in the country, he must watch the openings which are sure to present themselves: the man of talent will take advantage of them, and rise to wealth; the man without talent will go on slowly improving his condition, and will be happy and respected. What more can a man desire?”
“I agree with you, Phil; at the same time that I intend to look out for the openings, and walk in if I can,” answered D’Arcy. ”

“ The ice, though bearing in some places, could not be trusted, and of course the expedition to D’Arcy’s clearing was given up for the present; but in the evening, when work was over, skates were unpacked, cleared of rust, and fitted to shoes. All hands set to work with increased vigour to fell the trees, that they might be burnt off before the snow should make the operation more difficult. “Another night like the last, and I verily believe we might skate across the lake,” cried Harry, rubbing his hands to restore the circulation of which the cold had deprived them. ”

“ The dinner was the usual bush fare—pork and potatoes (forming an Irish stew) , fish, caught before the frost began, and a dumpling, which probably had been thought of only when the guests were first descried in the distance. The young men did ample justice to the feast, and perhaps spent a longer time over it than they intended. They had plenty to say, about their own experiences especially; and when the young Ashtons compared notes with D’Arcy, they had reason to consider their own trials far less than his. ”

“ Notwithstanding this, the romance of travelling through Canada is not altogether done away with. Although several of the chief cities contain very large populations, Montreal having 100,000 inhabitants, and Quebec and Toronto not many thousands less, and possessing likewise all the advantages required by civilised communities, yet a very few miles away from them the stranger may find himself in some wild district where he might suppose that the foot of man had never trod. ”

“ Philip and his brothers started up. “You must have coffee before you go; it is a home manufacture, and so are all the ingredients.” Terry poured it out of a veritable big coffeepot—hot, with plenty of sugar and milk. It was pronounced excellent. “See, Harry, you and Charley may supply your family with first-rate coffee,” said D’Arcy. “We shall have a thaw before the winter sets in; dig up all the dandelion roots you can find; dry them in the sun or in your oven for keeping; roast them before use; and cut them up and grind them as you would coffee-berries. ”

“ He found Mr Norman with a large dug-out canoe on runners, with a couple of poles, one on each side, and two men who had volunteered to accompany him.
“I’d go myself, but I guess I’d rather over-ballast your craft,” said Job Judson, turning round his rotund figure, such as was not often seen in the bush. Philip thanked him, and agreed that no more persons were required for the expedition.
Mr Norman insisted on going. “Do not be afraid of my being tired,” he remarked; “I have always lived in so hardy a way that nothing tires me.” ”

“ Come, let us examine your hut. Ah! the skin too has disappeared.”
“Yes, and I see that the remainder of the fish which D’Arcy gave us are not here,” said Philip, somewhat relieved. “But perhaps the island has been visited by some trapper, who would naturally carry off the most valuable parts of the bear.”
“Ah! but look here: if the island has been visited by a trapper, he came with a vehicle on runners from the direction of your clearing, and returned to the same place. There are the marks clear enough still; an Indian would have told us exactly how things occurred.” ”

“ As soon as I had established a business I left the steam-boat and went to live on shore, at the store, having first taken to wife the daughter of my old master. A very good wife she has made me, and I should like, some day, to bring her over to see you, Mrs Ashton; but you mustn’t expect to see a fine lady, such are not the good wives of this province. For many years she was a hardworking housewife, when helps were beings not to be procured for love or money. ”

“ There was, however, abundance of work to be done in the house, and plenty of hard exercise in sawing up logs for the stove fires. These, while the severer frost lasted, were never allowed to go out, and no one had reason to complain of the want of warmth inside the house; indeed, the walls were so thick, that they retained the heat in the way an ordinary brick or plank building could not have done. Old and young declared, that in spite of cold and snow, they had never spent a happier or pleasanter winter. ”